This research emerged from the need to improve the Netherlands’ contribution to international water and sanitation service delivery. Over the previous two decades these services were not found to be sufficiently sustainable according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2013). Sustainability has often been summarized as meeting economic, environmental and social objectives now and in the future. Different scholars argue that given the changing future conditions many development organizations are facing nowadays, a sustainable plan should also be robust, meaning that it performs well under a wide variety of futures, and adaptive, meaning that it can be adapted to changing future conditions.

To support researchers to publish their research Open Access, deals have been negotiated with various publishers. Depending on the deal, a discount is provided for the author on the Article Processing Charges that need to be paid by the author to publish an article Open Access. A discount of 100% means that (after approval) the author does not have to pay Article Processing Charges.

For the approval of an Open Access deal for an article, the corresponding author of this article must be affiliated with Wageningen University & Research.